A sample letter is below, with explanations as to how and why it was written in this form.

The brief for this advert was simple - find a successful way of writing to secondary schools selling to them a half day staff training programme in stress reduction.

The course had been advertised successfully for a number of years, using the same one page advert throughout.  However response rates have been declining for some time. 

The existing advert was criticised as being over-fussy in its design, with three columns leaving the reader unsure where he/she should  be reading at each point.  The headline simply stated the name of the course, and a considerable amount of space was taken up with details of course content, the background of the course leader, and comments from people who had attended the course in the past.   There was no emphasis at all on the benefits of the course - these were implied but not explicitly stated.

The comment I made was that by putting all the basic information on one page there was no space left to attract the reader's attention, discuss the benefits of the course, and develop the reader's enthusiasm.   I argued that a better approach would be to excite the reader with the benefits of the course first, and then have the information about price, the course leader etc later on - on a separate second page..   

Although the second page would increase cost, the increase was minimal  and one extra course booking in a mailing to (say) 5000 addresses would more than pay for the second page and leave plenty of profit to spare.

The aim of promotion was naturally to increase sales by far more than this.   I proposed that to do this, we should pose a question (the "interesting question" approach - one of the standard approaches to direct mail which are outlined on the Theory of Direct Mail website).

Here's what I wrote and handed over to the company - it is not a final proofed version of the letter, because when I write copy of this nature, the client has the right to make changes if he/she feels the need..  This is my version before anyone else gets their hands on it. 

There is more commentary after the letter, explaining why the letter is constructed as it is.

Major decisions made in the writing of the letter

Who to mail
Considering the reader's psychology
Headline challenges the reader
Avoiding exact promises
Repetition
Following the psychology of perception
Not starting with the title of the course, and not mentioning the company name
Opening sentence
PS
Skimming
Size
Time taken to do it

Who to mail

We agreed that we would mail this letter to Deputy Heads (the managers most closely associated with booking supply teachers and handling teacher absence) and the INSET co-ordinator.   My suggestion was that one third of the companies selected should get a letter to the Deputy Head, a third would get a letter to INSET, and the final third would get both letters, with an amended PS pointing out that the letter had also gone to the other recipient.

Considering the reader's psychology

The people to whom the letter is directed are managers in secondary schools.   In most cases the schools will have 50 staff or more.   Sometimes many more.      

I had no statistics or analysis provided by the client on this group of people, so I had to make some assumptions.    I knew that they would all be social class C1, and obviously would be intelligent having gained at least a bachelor's degree, and in some cases a master's or a doctorate.   They would be busy, would have a concern for their work and their school, and have enquiring minds (in the sense that no one goes into teaching without being inquisitive).      

The deputy heads would, I believe, be reading the letter in an office at a chosen time - when they felt it was right to do so.  But they were liable to be interrupted at any moment by a phone call, emails coming in, a visitor to the office, a problem child, a parent...   The INSET co-ordinator could be a worse situation, grabbing the lesson during a hurried mid-morning break while trying to get a coffee, possibly trying to avoid the eye of the deputy head (who wanted him/her to cover a lesson) trying to think what was being taught next...   Worse, almost all the staffrooms I know are too hot or too cold.   Not an ideal moment to try and sell.   

I particularly expected that the INSET co-ordinator would give the letter the merest of glances, and I really had to grab them with the headline.   Even though I anticipated the Deputy Heads would be easier targets and would give a little longer to the task, I knew I would have to grab them and hold them within five seconds, no more.

Thus my view was that most readers would look at the letter (our own research suggests that overall the vast majority of school sales letters other than those to the head are opened and glanced at by the intended reader).   I had to grab them in five seconds.

The background of these readers in terms of the nature of their studies at university, was also uncertain - this was not like writing to the head of maths who almost certainly did maths at university.   Therefore I had to write in general terms, but without giving that away.  I tried to make the letter work so that the reader would somehow feel it was addressed to him/her personally, and that although no mention was made of his/her teaching, this was understood by the writer.

Headline challenges the reader

The aim of the headline is to invite readership of the piece - even among the cynical and extremely busy.  My argument is that even if you are certain that you have got your school running as effectively as possible you are still going to cast your eye down this letter - just in case there is something here for you (or just to prove that the writer is wrong).   Even if this casting of your eyes down the letter is done in the full belief that you don't need to read this the reader is still reading.

The headline is therefore the key element - if that fails to grab the reader everything else fails.   But even if the reader is grabbed at this point there is still no certainty he/she will read it all.

Avoiding exact promises

The advertiser made it clear that they did not have any clear statistical evidence that their course did in fact reduce stress.  There were many positive comments from schools that had used the course, but no one had undertaken a reliable analysis of the level of stress illness before and after the course.

I therefore chose to use words and phrases that I doubted would ever lead to the letter being referred to the Advertising Standards Authority - even if it was seen by one of the advertiser's rivals (I believe most ASA complaints are made by rivals to the advertiser, rather than recipients).  The letter was not submitted to the ASA or CAP committee for their views, since my clients are always free to change the text in any way they like.  It is however always made clear to clients that they might like to do this themselves if they have any doubts or worries.

Repetition

Without overplaying the part I have tried to repeat just one or two words to emphasise them - but I do believe that in a letter like this additional repetition beyond this point does not work.   I do not feel you can use the direct mail equivalent of shouting at people of this type.  So I avoid lots of exclamation marks.  There is no

This is the training programme you must take!

or even

The best training deal you will see this year!

I am appealing on an intellectual basis, treating the reader seriously.  If you have read any of my work you'll know that understanding the psychology (i.e. the personality and world view) of the reader is utterly central to writing successful direct mail.

Following the psychology of perception

This is another point from the 3 Fundamental Laws - knowing how people read a sheet of A4 paper.  Although this does not show up on the internet, the piece was designed for the client's headed paper so that the headline goes about one quarter to one third of the way down the page.  This maximises the impact .  There are no illustrations on the page, (again reflecting the psychology of perception - see the articles on grabby images on the theory of direct mail site) and my aim here is to diminish any appeal of the logo or company heading - I am aiming to get the reader to see the headline and then follow it.

Not starting with the title of the course, and not mentioning the company name.

I remember being told by a client some years ago that I clearly didn't know what I was doing because everyone knew that a successful sales letter needed to mention the company name five times, preferably in bold each time, and certainly twice within the first four lines.

I have never found this to be true, having measured the effectiveness of hundreds of sales letters.  Besides, most of the people who received this would not recognise the name of the training company.  But they might recognise the name of the course - because they had been mailed the details before.  Yet they would have rejected the course, and having done so in the past would be tempted to reject it again on the grounds that they had clearly thought about it last  time and rejected it, and so had no need to consider the matter again.

This comment along the lines that one has to do this or do that in a mailshot, is at the heart of the argument between a theorist such as myself, and those who make up individual rules.  To me the people who make up rules ("you must mention the company five times", "you must limit yourself to 200 words" or even "you can only sell this product on price") are invariably wrong, because they fail to take into account different readerships.   A Daily Star reading individual from social class D responds in an utterly different way from a Guardian reading social class C1 teacher.       

My approach is to start by considering the individual, and then let everything flow from there.  To me there are no rules which can exist outside of the approach that says, we must consider the reader first.

This may appear to be a highly abstruse argument.  I mention it because if you show a letter such as the one here to someone else in the direct mail industry there is every chance that person will bring up some "rule"  to show that this approach is all nonsense.   If you would like to read further on this matter, there's a website devoted to it - www.theory.bz 

Opening sentence

A key moment - if I get them past the headline then they will glance here.  This is a reminder of what I wrote

Asking for a simultaneous cut in expenditure and an improvement in quality seems a bit like asking for a perpetual motion machine – a nice idea but it does rather break the basic laws of the universe.

I tried to keep it light, but serious, interesting, but with a very modest twist of humour.  The phrase "laws of the universe" was a change from a variation on this letter that I wrote to promote a similar course in to businesses, where I used the phrase "laws of physics".   I was concerned that a teacher in a hurry might see "physics" and think "not for me" and throw it away.    Even single words can have this impact.

But I was making the point that even if they were not going to buy, the letter could be interesting, stimulating, a light read, and maybe even informative.   Of course efficiency and expenditure having nothing to do with the immutable laws of the universe.   But I think the notion that it is  "Worth reading on" still comes across despite of, or perhaps because of, this inaccuracy.   

PS

The PS is the third most important element of the letter after the headline and opening sentence.  I try to drive the reader who has skipped down the page back into the letter with Besides the benefits mentioned above,   If you have not been reading you could be forced back to look again.  Benefits?  What benefits?

Skimming

Which brings us to skimming.  If you do get people beyond your headline then the chances are they will then start to skim down the page, not reading everything but instead just reading the start of each paragraph.   To keep these people with me I do four things here.  One is to add a couple of very short paragraphs.  The second is to make the opening of each paragraph of some interest.  The third is to keep all the paragraphs down to a modest size, and the last is to ensure there is a double return after each, so the breaks between the paragraphs are obvious.

If you are interested in this point you might care to look at the letter again and read the first few lines of each paragraph on their own.  I believe they are all fairly powerful directive phrases that can catch the passing reader.

Size 

"I don't think anyone is going to read all this," I have been told in response to letters of this type.  Possibly true - but it doesn't really matter if they skip down the page and then get deeply interested in the details of the course on the next page.  The job here is to stop the reader looking for five seconds and throwing it in the bin.

I believe many people trapped by the headline do read it all, but even a partial read can be enough to hold the attention and get the reader to consider the matter further - which means looking at the second page and considering the booking form.

Time taken to do it

A letter like this, written after I had been fully briefed, takes me about 3 hours to write.  I mention this because time and again I see letters where the writer admits after some discussion that it was written in 20 minutes or so.    Whether you like my approach here or not, I do not believe you can consider all the issues that are to be contemplated in the writing of such a letter, and get them into a coherent whole in anything less than three hours.   It used to take me far longer - only practice has got it down to this length of time.

I would say, if you are writing a sales letter in much less time than this, you are either stunningly talented, or you are not really considering all the issues.

Copyright

The letter and the explanations were written by Tony Attwood of Hamilton House Mailings plc.  To discuss having Tony write a letter or brochure for your company please call 01536 399 000 or email creative@hamilton-house.com

The article and the letter are (c) Tony Attwood 2006, and must not be reprinted, used or transmitted in any form in whole or in part using any medium without written permission from and payment to Hamilton House Mailings plc